While walking through the halls of one of the buildings on campus late one evening, a nefarious individual found green bar sheets in a box outside an office. The interloper took a closer look and found the mother lode, green bar sheets with names, SSNs and grades. The individual uses the information to steal the identity of more than one student.
The above scenario is not that far-fetched. Sensitive information is often found discarded in the office trash cans, dumpsters and in hallway receptacles.
While we may have quit printing green bar sheets years ago, they still surface along with other documents, and sometimes they surface in the halls, unattended. Make it a practice to shred documents with sensitive information. Documents to shred include:
- Scantron forms
- Greenbar grade sheets
- Rosters printed from K-State Online, iSIS, etc.
- Student papers with personal identity information and grades
- Data with credit card information and canceled checks
- Personnel files
- Other sensitive papers with identity or financial information
Betsy Draper, Interim Chief Information Security Officer, suggests, “If you are in doubt about shredding, err on the safe side and shred anyway.”
If you have a large amount to shred and would like to contract the work out, Document Resources Inc. is on state contract.
Resources
- Retention of Records policy — Review policies before destroying documents.
- University Retention Schedules — Length of time to retain specific documents. For additional clarification, contact Ryan Leimkuehler, University Records Manager, (785-532-5013), rleimkue@ksu.edu.
